I have written about Donald Trump’s rapidly deteriorating mental health so frequently that the Editorial Board might be mistaken for a newsletter about dementia, not politics.

Thankfully, I’m no longer alone in my labors. After last week’s debacles by Trump, awareness of his condition has spread such that some respectable people are using the d-word to describe reality.

Last Monday, Trump swayed and bopped to music. He appeared to have forgotten he was campaigning for president. By Saturday night, in what was billed as the closing argument of his campaign, he spent the first dozen minutes reminiscing about a golfing legend’s schlong.

Here’s how CNN anchor Jake Tapper put it Sunday: Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris offered “sharply different closing messages. Harris kept the focus on Trump, questioning his fitness for office while, in a major speech to the voters of Pennsylvania, Donald Trump went off on a 12-minute tangent on former pro-golfer Arnold Palmer, which included this bizarre anecdote about the athlete’s penis.”

---

pic.twitter.com/hm1ctbaM6g

— The Editorial Board (@johnastoehr) October 21, 2024

---

The Times’ Michael Gold wrote that “the performance, 17 days before the election in a critical battleground state, added to the impression of the Republican nominee as increasingly unfiltered and undisciplined. It comes as some of Mr. Trump’s allies and aides worry that Mr. Trump’s temperament and crass style are alienating undecided voters.”

“Unfiltered and undisciplined” is one way of putting it. 

Dementia is another. 

Former Republican Bruce Bartlett said “Trump’s unhinged comments today about Arnold Palmer should be interpreted in light of the fact these kinds of crazy things are a symptom of advanced dementia.”

Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer, wrote: “I am no doctor, but my doctor friends say that Donald Trump has classic early symptoms of Lewy-body dementia.” He went on to say: “The signs are inappropriate behavior and statements and not finishing your sentences or thoughts. Possibly the reason why Donald won’t release his medical records.”

The Kamala Harris campaign issued a press release saying that “Donald Trump focused on the issue most important to voters in this election: a deceased golfer’s … anatomy.” The headline to the statement read:

“Trump’s Pennsylvania Closing Argument Is Literal Junk.” 

There are now calls for more sustained coverage by the Washington press corps. “Imagine if mainstream outlets had covered Trump’s dementia from the beginning,” wrote the Post’s Jennifer Rubin. 

CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE FOR JUST $6 A MONTH!

---

Click here to leave a tip. 10? Thanks!

---

Media critic Jay Rosen said “his decline is where critics of campaign coverage should focus their blitz from now to November 5.”

Kimberly Atkins Stohr, a columnist for the Boston Globe, said his decline is dangerous to ignore. “We can see the decline in [Trump’s] ability to hold a train of thought, speak coherently or demonstrate a command of the English language, to say nothing of policy.” Why is he being held to a different standard than Joe Biden was? she asked.

Some of the press corps are scrambling to catch up. The AP published a rundown last Wednesday of some of Trump’s “senior moments”: 

• “He regularly confuses timelines, events and people. At a town hall-style forum in Fayetteville, North Carolina, Trump seemed to have no recollection of meeting with a severely injured veteran and his family. The veteran’s wife noted that ‘you visited with him many times’ and ‘you just saw him this summer.’” 
• “Trump has also confused Republican rival Nikki Haley with former Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. He confused the location of a major military base. He mistakenly said that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán led Turkey.”
• “During a meandering news conference riddled with false and misleading statements in August, Trump recalled riding as a passenger in the chopper with former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown when it was forced to make an emergency landing. 
• “Brown later said he had never shared a helicopter with Trump. Instead, it was likely a Los Angeles city councilman, who is also Black, who shared a rocky helicopter ride” decades ago. 
• “More recently, at a rally in Wisconsin, he seemed to squint at teleprompters as he lurched from subject to subject. He described the country as a ‘third-world hellhole.’ He then told his audience, ‘Remember, there’s a hat that’s made that sells like crazy,’ before interrupting himself to comment on a fly. ‘Oh there’s a fly, I wonder where the fly came from. See, two years ago, I wouldn’t have had a fly up here. You’re changing rapidly.’”
• “He has begun boasting about his ‘beautiful body’ and describes his often long-winded speeches as ‘flawless.’ Trump regularly acknowledges questions about his age and health during public appearances.” On Sunday, he “mocked critics who declare him ‘cognitively impaired’ because he ‘mispronounced a word.’”

Heather Cox Richardson said his performance over the last week seems to confirm that the October surprise of this election is “the increasingly obvious mental incapacity of the Republican candidate.”

I mean, he fell asleep at his own event Friday. 

But it’s a surprise only in that few were paying attention to it as long as President Biden was campaigning. It is Trump who is now the oldest person ever to run for president. He’s not only running against an opponent who is nearly 20 years younger, he’s running against an opponent who won’t let up on her focus on his health and fitness. 

After releasing her medical records, she challenged Trump to release his. He hasn’t yet. His campaign has also canceled media appearances, reportedly because he’s suffering from exhaustion. “It makes you wonder: Why does his staff want him to hide away?” Harris asked last week. “One must question: Are they afraid that people will see that he is too weak and unstable to lead America? Is that what’s going on?”

And every time Trump stumbles, the Harris campaign pounces. 

Last week, after the Al Smith Dinner, the vice president’s staff released a statement saying that Trump “struggled to read scripted notes written by his handlers, repeatedly complaining that he couldn’t use a teleprompter. He stumbled over his words and lashed out when the crowd wouldn’t laugh with him. The rare moments he was off script, he went on long incomprehensible rambles, reminding Americans how unstable he has become. And, of course, he made it all about himself. He may refuse to release his medical records, but every day, he makes it clear to the American people that he is not up for the job.”